Category: resume

our resume is still a vital component to getting you the interview to the job of your dreams. It’s one of the first impressions that a hiring manager will have when you apply to a new job or position, and one of the biggest determinants about whether or not you will get called for an interview.

While you can upgrade your education and get more work experience, these things take time. So what’s the easiest way to improve your resume in the least amount of time? The answer is good proofreading.

You want your resume to accurately describe who you are as a professional. Because of this, you will want your resume to be completely free of errors.

Here are six ways to proof your resume so that it is impressive and error-free:

5) Take a break, and then give it a second look

Leaving a document alone for a while, doing something else and then coming back to it later, will give you a fresher set of eyes. It’s just like getting a second opinion. Try to leave an hour or so at least before giving it a second look.

6) Read it out loud

Sometimes, your eyes just don’t catch the mistakes. If you are an auditory learner, or if you want to double check your work, reading your resume out loud can help you identify problems with sentence structure and wording.

You know what I’m talking about — those faceless, anonymous ATS recruiting portals that try to screen people in or out of a hiring pipeline using keyword-searching software.

That’s a ridiculous way to hire people! I was an HR VP and I didn’t need software to scan resumes for keywords.

Don’t say “Companies get flooded with applications.” That’s no defense.

If they do, that’s their own fault. It’s bad marketing. Would you be sympathetic to your marketing folks at work if the sales team said “We’re spending all our time talking to the wrong customers, people who call us but would never buy our products?”

Of course not! You would tell your marketing people to market to the right audience, not just the biggest audience they can find.

HR people are in sales and marketing now, whether they know it or not!

You can reach your own hiring manager, the person who will be your boss, directly at his or her desk. It’s not hard to do. Here’s how to find that person.

Here are five ways to make your resume much more compelling, readable and relevant than it is right now.

3) Add Dragon-Slaying Stories

Dragon-Slaying Stories are quick stories that tell us how you came, saw and conquered on your past jobs. Don’t tell us about the boring, out-of-context tasks you performed at your past assignments. We can figure them out from your job titles!

Anybody in those past jobs would have performed the exact same tasks you did. Tell us what you left in your wake, instead! Here are two Dragon-Slaying Stories to illustrate:

In my boss’ absence I solved a $140K billing snarl-up that would have cost our company its largest customer if we hadn’t gotten things straightened out fast.

When our two biggest rivals merged, I launched a grassroots email marketing campaign that brought in $25K in new sales.

Dragon-Slaying Stories are quick, but they pack a lot punch. We only need to know why you had to act, what you did to solve your problem and why it was a good thing to do.

You don’t need many Dragon-Slaying Stories after each past job listed on your resume. Two or three are plenty!

How much time do you think a recruiter takes to go through a resume? A few minutes maybe? Is this what you thought?

Well, the truth, according to a study by TheLadders, is that recruiters spend an average of six seconds reviewing an individual’s resume.

Sounds insane, right?

So, now the real question is how to get your resume noticed so that it can last more than those 6 seconds.

In this guest post, Tressie Williams, a corporate professional with a passion for corporate recruiting, outlines 6 top tips to make your resume stand out quickly…

2. Are You Sending The Same Resume Everywhere?

The most common mistake almost everyone does is, send the same resume to every organization that they apply for.

The key to get your resume noticed and to get the job is to optimize it according to the profile of the company you are applying for. Be creative in this part because recruiters are not an expert in the field for which they recruit. They are just normal people looking for certain specific keywords on the resume to see if the person is capable of the job or not.

So never forget to add those keywords in your resume, else it will be trashed by a computer before it even reaches a human being.

In addition, avoid grammatical & spelling mistakes at all cost. They are absolutely inexcusable in the 21st century.

5. Your Achievements Speaks For You

If you are still stuck with those high school achievements on your resume, then better use that space to get your resume noticed for the real achievements you have achieved over the years.

That light hearted information will eventually come up in the face to face interview. So, use this part of the resume to enable the potential employer to understand the kind of performer you were in the previous positions you have held.

Research has shown that your past performance predicts your future performance. So, never forget to add the challenges you faced, the actions you took to correct the problems and what the results were.

20 seconds. That’s the average amount of time that an employer will spend scanning your resume.

The phrase “less is more” has often been used for design purposes, but it can apply just as well to your resume.

The point is to keep only information on your resume that is clear, simple and that supports your brand/message. It is a balance of having just enough information to draw the interest of an employer, while leaving room for you to further explain during an interview.

The more irrelevant information you add to your resume, the more it dilutes your key message. Employers today also look right through fluff words and are rather annoyed by them.

So, you ask, “How can I power up my resume and make sure it contains the precise balance of information?” Consider the following things to remove from your resume:

Employers today are not that interested in what you want. Your opening paragraph needs to be a strong message that summarizes your background and indicates what you are best at. That creates a theme that is then followed by your ‘proving’ that you are great at these things by showcasing supporting accomplishments in each job.

8. Eliminate technical skills for basic software programs.

Most employers today expect you to be familiar with the basic computer programs, such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.

9. Do not include references unless requested.

Employers today expect you to offer references when requested, which is typically during the latter part of the interview process. A top five Peeve of recruiters is seeing “References available upon request” on the resume. Do you really know anyone who would refuse to give references?

You could have all the skills experience to make you the best candidate for a role, but if you’ve made sloppy mistakes on your resume, or not taken the time to write it in a way that will get you noticed, it could cost you the job.

Recruiters generally make up their mind about a candidate within 60 seconds of glancing at their resume, so it could be something as small as a spelling error that gets your application discarded.

So what makes a stand out resume and what are the most common mistakes that job seekers make? Ayers have the answers.

CV and Resume Statistics:

Recruiters spend an average of 3.14 minutes reading a candidate’s resume and they have generally made up their mind within the first minute.

1 in 5 recruiters will actually reject a candidate before they’ve even finished reading their resume.

5% of applicants are dishonest when describing their previous roles or the time they spent in a job.

10% of job seekers have applied for 50 or more jobs without hearing back.

What are the top reasons that recruiters reject a resume?

59% of recruiters will reject a candidate because of poor grammar or a spelling error. Though these mistakes seem small, they indicate that the candidate is sloppy and hasn’t taken the time to proofread their resume.

Over 50% of recruiters will reject a candidate if their resume is full of cliches. You need to differentiate yourself from the crowd, cliches are boring.

Over 40% are also put off by too much design, such as snazzy borders, inappropriate fonts, clipart images…..or even an emoji!

4. Keep Everything Bite-Sized

Most employers today aren’t sitting down and spending several minutes on each resume, it’s more like seconds – 7—8 seconds to be exact. When you keep information bite-sized, it makes it easier for hiring managers and recruiters to read and find information they need to determine if you’re worth a callback.

5. Dates

Since many of today’s resumes are run through the ATS, you need to take caution with how dates are presented on the resume. The ATS reads information on the resume with a different approach than how a human reviewer would, so you want to avoid throwing in dates randomly as you describe experience or accomplishments because the ATS will typically associate it as an employment date. You also need to avoid using seasons like Winter or Summer to indicate and employment period because the ATS does not know how to interpret that information. For more tips and insight, read: “How To Make Dates On A Resume Work For You.” Lastly, it’s unnecessary to state the year you graduated from college because it can give away your age, which can be a factor for discrimination.

7. Spelling

A resume filled with misspellings and other writing errors call out unprofessionalism. Don’t rely on Word to help you catch mistakes because they may catch some, but not all. Always get the help of another pair of eyes to read it over for you.